The Complete Poems of Christina Rossetti :: :: University of Virginia Library

Alone Lord God, in Whom our trust and peace,
Our love and our desire, glow bright with hope;
Lift us above this transitory scope
Of earth, these pleasures that begin and cease,
This moon which wanes, these seasons which decrease:
We turn to Thee; as on an eastern slope
Wheat feels the dawn beneath night's lingering cope,
Bending and stretching sunward ere it sees.
Alone Lord God, we see not yet we know;
By love we dwell with patience and desire,
And loving so and so desiring pray;
Thy will be done in earth as heaven today;
As yesterday it was, tomorrow so;
Love offering love on love's self-feeding fire.

[Seven vials hold Thy wrath: but what can hold]

Seven vials hold Thy wrath: but what can hold
Thy mercy save Thine own Infinitude
Boundlessly overflowing with all good,
All lovingkindness, all delights untold?
Thy Love, of each created love the mould;
Thyself, of all the empty plenitude;
Heard of at Ephrata, found in the Wood,
For ever One, the Same, and Manifold.

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Lord, give us grace to tremble with that dove
Which Ark-bound winged its solitary way
And overpast the Deluge in a day,
Whom Noah's hand pulled in and comforted:
For we who much more hang upon Thy Love
Behold its shadow in the deed he did.

“Where neither rust nor moth doth corrupt.”

Nerve us with patience, Lord, to toil or rest,
Toiling at rest on our allotted level;
Unsnared, unscared by world or flesh or devil,
Fulfilling the good Will of Thy behest;
Not careful here to hoard, not here to revel;
But waiting for our treasure and our zest
Beyond the fading splendour of the west,
Beyond this deathstruck life and deathlier evil.
Not with the sparrow building here a house:
But with the swallow tabernacling so
As still to poise alert to rise and go
On eager wings with wing-outspeeding wills
Beyond earth's gourds and past her almond boughs,
Past utmost bound of the everlasting hills.

“As the sparks fly upwards.”

Lord, grant us wills to trust Thee with such aim
Of hope and passionate craving of desire,
That we may mount aspiring, and aspire
Still while we mount; rejoicing in Thy Name
Yesterday, this day, day by day the Same:
So sparks fly upward scaling heaven by fire,
Still mount and still attain not, yet draw nigher
While they have being to their fountain flame.

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To saints who mount, the bottomless abyss
Is as mere nothing, they have set their face
Onward and upward toward that blessèd place
Where man rejoices with his God, and soul
With soul, in the unutterable kiss
Of peace for every victor at the goal.

[Lord, make us all love all: that when we meet]

Lord, make us all love all: that when we meet
Even myriads of earth's myriads at Thy Bar,
We may be glad as all true lovers are
Who having parted count reunion sweet.
Safe gathered home around Thy blessèd Feet,
Come home by different roads from near or far,
Whether by whirlwind or by flaming car,
From pangs or sleep, safe folded round Thy seat.
Oh, if our brother's blood cry out at us,
How shall we meet Thee Who hast loved us all,
Thee Whom we never loved, not loving him?
The unloving cannot chant with Seraphim,
Bear harp of gold or palm victorious,
Or face the Vision Beatifical.

[O lord, I am ashamed to seek Thy Face]

O lord, I am ashamed to seek Thy Face
As tho' I loved Thee as Thy saints love Thee:
Yet turn from those Thy lovers, look on me,
Disgrace me not with uttermost disgrace;
But pour on me ungracious, pour Thy grace
To purge my heart and bid my will go free,
Till I too taste Thy hidden Sweetness, see
Thy hidden Beauty in the holy place.
O Thou Who callest sinners to repent,
Call me Thy sinner unto penitence,
For many sins grant me the greater love:
Set me above the waterfloods, above
Devil and shifting world and fleshly sense,
Thy Mercy's all-amazing monument.

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[It is not death, O Christ, to die for Thee]

It is not death, O Christ, to die for Thee:
Nor is that silence of a silent land
Which speaks Thy praise so all may understand:
Darkness of death makes Thy dear lovers see
Thyself Who Wast and Art and Art to Be;
Thyself, more lovely than the lovely band
Of saints who worship Thee on either hand,
Loving and loved thro' all eternity.
Death is not death, and therefore do I hope:
Nor silence silence; and I therefore sing
A very humble hopeful quiet psalm,
Searching my heart-field for an offering;
A handful of sun-courting heliotrope,
Of myrrh a bundle, and a little balm.

[Lord, grant us eyes to see and ears to hear]

Lord, grant us eyes to see and ears to hear,
And souls to love and minds to understand,
And steadfast faces toward the Holy Land,
And confidence of hope, and filial fear,
And citizenship where Thy saints appear
Before Thee heart in heart and hand in hand,
And Alleluias where their chanting band
As waters and as thunders fill the sphere.
Lord, grant us what Thou wilt, and what Thou wilt
Deny, and fold us in Thy peaceful fold:
Not as the world gives, give to us Thine own:
Inbuild us where Jerusalem is built
With walls of jasper and with streets of gold,
And Thou Thyself, Lord Christ, for Corner Stone.

“Cried out with Tears.”

Lord, I believe, help Thou mine unbelief:
Lord, I repent, help mine impenitence:
Hide not Thy Face from me, nor spurn me hence,
Nor utterly despise me in my grief;

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Nor say me nay, who worship with the thief
Bemoaning my so long lost innocence:—
Ah me! my penitence a fresh offence,
Too tardy and too tepid and too brief.
Lord, must I perish, I who look to Thee?
Look Thou upon me, bid me live, not die;
Say “Come,” say not “Depart,” tho' Thou art just:
Yea, Lord, be mindful how out of the dust
I look to Thee while Thou dost look on me,
Thou Face to face with me and Eye to eye.

[O Lord, on Whom we gaze and dare not gaze]

O Lord, on Whom we gaze and dare not gaze,
Increase our faith that gazing we may see,
And seeing love, and loving worship Thee
Thro' all our days, our long and lengthening days.
O Lord, accessible to prayer and praise,
Kind Lord, Companion of the two or three,
Good Lord, be gracious to all men and me,
Lighten our darkness and amend our ways.
Call up our hearts to Thee, that where Thou art
Our treasure and our heart may dwell at one:
Then let the pallid moon pursue her sun,
So long as it shall please Thee, far apart,—
Yet art Thou with us, Thou to Whom we run,
We hand in hand with Thee and heart in heart.

“I will come and heal him.”

O Lord God, hear the silence of each soul,
Its cry unutterable of ruth and shame,
Its voicelessness of self-contempt and blame:
Nor suffer harp and palm and aureole
Of multitudes who praise Thee at the goal,
To set aside Thy poor and blind and lame;
Nor blazing Seraphs utterly to outflame
The spark that flies up from each earthly coal.

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My price Thy priceless Blood; and therefore I
Price of Thy priceless Blood am precious so
That good things love me in their love of Thee:
I comprehend not why Thou lovedst me
With Thy so mighty Love; but this I know,
No man hath greater love than thus to die.

[Ah Lord, Lord, if my heart were right with Thine]

Ah Lord, Lord, if my heart were right with Thine
As Thine with mine, then should I rest resigned
Awaiting knowledge with a quiet mind
Because of heavenly wisdom's anodyne.
Then would Thy Love be more to me than wine,
Then should I seek being sure at length to find,
Then should I trust to Thee all humankind
Because Thy Love of them is more than mine.
Then should I stir up hope and comfort me
Remembering Thy Cradle and Thy Cross;
How Heaven to Thee without us had been loss,
How Heaven with us is Thy one only Heaven,
Heaven shared with us thro' all eternity,
With us long sought, long loved, and much forgiven.

“The gold of that land is good.”

I long for joy, O Lord, I long for gold,
I long for all Thou profferest to me,
I long for the unimagined manifold
Abundance laid up in Thy treasury.
I long for pearls, but not from mundane sea;
I long for palms, but not from earthly mould;
Yet in all else I long for, long for Thee,
Thyself to hear and worship and behold.
For Thee, beyond the splendour of that day
Where all is day and is not any night;
For Thee, beyond refreshment of that rest
To which tired saints press on for its delight:—

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Or if not thus for Thee, yet Thee I pray
To make me long so till Thou make me blest.

[Weigh all my faults and follies righteously]

Weigh all my faults and follies righteously,
Omissions and commissions, sin on sin;
Make deep the scale, O Lord, to weigh them in;
Yea, set the Accuser vulture-eyed to see
All loads ingathered which belong to me:
That so in life the judgement may begin,
And Angels learn how hard it is to win
One solitary sinful soul to Thee.
I have no merits for a counterpoise:
Oh vanity my work and hastening day,
What can I answer to the accusing voice?
Lord, drop Thou in the counterscale alone
One Drop from Thine own Heart, and overweigh
My guilt, my folly, even my heart of stone.

[Lord, grant me grace to love Thee in my pain]

Lord, grant me grace to love Thee in my pain,
Thro' all my disappointment love Thee still,
Thy love my strong foundation and my hill,
Tho' I be such as cometh not again,
A fading leaf, a spark upon the wane:
So evermore do Thou Thy perfect Will
Beloved thro' all my good, thro' all mine ill,
Beloved tho' all my love beside be vain.
If thus I love Thee, how wilt Thou love me,
Thou Who art greater than my heart? (Amen!)
Wilt Thou bestow a part, withhold a part?
The longing of my heart cries out to Thee,
The hungering thirsting longing of my heart:
What I forewent wilt Thou not grant me then?

[Lord, make me one with Thine own faithful ones]

Lord, make me one with Thine own faithful ones,
Thy Saints who love Thee and are loved by Thee;
Till the day break and till the shadows flee,

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At one with them in alms and orisons;
At one with him who toils and him who runs,
And him who yearns for union yet to be;
At one with all who throng the crystal sea
And wait the setting of our moons and suns.
Ah, my beloved ones gone on before,
Who looked not back with hand upon the plough!
If beautiful to me while still in sight,
How beautiful must be your aspects now;
Your unknown, well-known aspects in that light
Which clouds shall never cloud for evermore.

“Light of Light.”

O Christ our Light, Whom even in darkness we
(So we look up) discern and gaze upon,
O Christ, Thou loveliest Light that ever shone,
Thou Light of Light, Fount of all lights that be,
Grant us clear vision of Thy Light to see,
Tho' other lights elude us, or begone
Into the secret of oblivion,
Or gleam in places higher than man's degree.
Who looks on Thee looks full on his desire,
Who looks on Thee looks full on Very Love:
Looking, he answers well, “What lack I yet?”
His heat and cold wait not on earthly fire,
His wealth is not of earth to lose or get;
Earth reels, but he has stored his store above.